Outrage at prison van death of tribal elder

CANBERRA - Outrage is growing at the death of a West Australian Aboriginal man left to cook to death in a prison van so hot that that he suffered third degree burns when he collapsed to its bare metal floor.

Even with an ice bath, hospital staff could not reduce the 46-year-old father-of-four's body temperature to below 41C after a four-hour ride through the Outback.

The tribal elder, known only as Mr Ward for cultural reasons, had been arrested for drunk driving.

West Australian Coroner Alastair Hope has recommended criminal charges be laid for a journey in a vehicle "not fit for humans" in 47C without air conditioning and with only a 600ml bottle of water.

Ward's family intend seeking compensation from the State Government and will begin civil action against the private contractor involved, C4S, which had previously been the subject of a scathing investigation in Queensland.

The Government has also been accused of operating a deficient fleet of vehicles and its policy of privatisation has been questioned by both Hope and the Prison Officers' Union.

The tragedy of Ward's death in January last year follows continuing concern at the treatment of indigenous Australians within the police and justice system, and at high rates of Aboriginal incarceration.

A long series of reforms was recommended after a federal royal commission into Aboriginal deaths in custody in 1986, and was brought sharply back into focus by the riots and court cases that followed the death in custody of Mulrunji Doomadgee on Queensland's Palm Island in 2004.

The Australian Institute of Criminology's most recent report on the jailing of Aborigines said that while the incidence of indigenous deaths in custody had fallen, they remained "over-represented" in police and prison statistics. They remain 17 times more likely than other Australians to be arrested or detained, and their rate of imprisonment is 13 times higher.

Ward was placed in the van by two C4S guards, Nina Stokoe and Graham Powell, for the 350km trip between Laverton and Kalgoorlie, in the Goldfields region, on January 27 last year.

Hope found that the van was seriously deficient, with all-metal surfaces, little light, limited airflow, no air-conditioning and no safety restraints for prisoners, and inadequate means of communication between prisoners and guards.

A panic button at the rear of the van was not prominently displayed and, if operated, set off a light on the dashboard that could not be seen in sunlight.

The two guards had further failed to check on Ward during the journey.

The guards told the inquest into Ward's death that they thought the air-conditioner was working but could not explain why they had not checked his welfare. They had stopped when they heard a thump from the back and found Ward unconscious.

But Hope said the guards' evidence was unreliable and untruthful at times, and that they may have colluded in presenting it.

He also said the Government and the Department of Corrective Services had contributed to Ward's "inhumane" treatment and terrible death by failing to ensure proper vehicles were used in the transport of prisoners.

The department had been aware of problems with the vehicle fleet, admitting that more than 60 faults had been reported since Ward's death.

Daisy Ward, a cousin of Ward, told ABC radio that the family wanted to see charges laid and that it would seek millions in compensation from the Government as well as taking civil action against C4S.

CONTRACTOR IN TROUBLE BEFORE

Aboriginal elder Mr Ward, who died trapped in 47C heat in a West Australian prison van, was not the first to suffer at the hands of the private contractor transporting the state's prisoners.

The company, C4S, was awarded the contract a year after a Queensland investigation disclosed that its operations had placed the lives of immigration detainees at risk during a seven-hour transfer from Melbourne to South Australia in 2004.

The ABC's Four Corners programme said that the investigation, by Keith Hamburger, then head of Queensland's Corrective Services, found that none of the detainees was fed during the journey. The investigation found that the company had endangered lives, humiliated the detainees, and had ignored appeals from passengers in obvious distress.

One of the detainees told Four Corners: "People [were] in the back shouting and crying and I was banging as well because I needed to go to the toilet. They didn't stop for anything, and I have to do it in the car."

Hamburger told the programme that he had been shocked and appalled by the findings, and was now worried by Ward's death in a C4S van.

"If these issues are being repeated that's a matter of great concern, because this is not rocket science."